Bernard Knight - Where Death Delights

‘I’m running that blood and urine you brought in, for alcohol,’ she explained. ‘Angela said she had a call from a defence lawyer wanting a urine sample tested in a road traffic case, so maybe we can work up some business in that direction?’

He nodded, wishing that the government would get on with bringing in a fixed maximum blood level for drivers, rather than relying on clinical testing by police surgeons of ability to drive. Apart from issues of road safety, it would be healthy for his bank balance, as many arrested drivers would want a second analysis as a check.

Feeling at a loose end – and rather redundant with the two women working away at something to which he couldn’t contribute – he went to his room and started to read the most recent issue of the British Medical Journal .

It was four o’clock before Mitchell arrived and this coincided nicely with a tea break. After introducing him to his colleagues and showing him the laboratory, they sat in the staff room over Typhoo Tips and Peek Freans, while the former detective superintendent told them about his findings in Ledbury.

‘The story was bit “iffy” from the start,’ he said.

‘Molly Barnes said her husband was a keen fisherman, but the chaps I spoke to in the pub said they’d never heard of him going fishing.’

‘There was no fishing rod found near the body?’ asked Angela.

‘No, and what’s more, there’s no fishing allowed in that reservoir. So if Albert went there, it was for something else.’

‘How is he supposed to have got there?’ asked Sian, determined not to be left out of the team.

‘On his pushbike, that’s something his pals in the Red Lion confirmed,’ said Trevor. ‘He was a keen cyclist, apparently. Often at weekends, he used to go off on his own into the country, probably to get away from his wife!’

‘But the bike has never been found?’ asked Angela.

‘No, but it’s not easy to identify cycles, maybe a long way from home – and they get pinched all the time.’

‘Perhaps he had a lady friend somewhere and he’s done a runner with her,’ suggested Richard.

‘With a sharp-mouthed wife like Molly, I wouldn’t be surprised – though he didn’t take any of his clothes or possessions, according to her.’

‘If you can believe anything she says,’ muttered Sian, darkly. She had already decided the wife was guilty.

‘What else has raised your suspicions?’ asked Pryor.

‘I had a quick look at that wedding ring that she showed me so reluctantly. When I got home, I checked the hall marks, it was assayed in Birmingham in 1931, which is a bit odd, as they weren’t married until 1941.’

‘I’ll bet she’ll have an answer for that,’ said Sian.

‘She’ll say it was second-hand, they couldn’t afford a new one.’

Mitchell nodded. ‘Or say they had to get wed quickly when he was on leave during the war. But it’s still odd, like the wristwatch.’

‘What about it?’ asked Angela.

‘It was an expensive one, an Omega. His missus spun me some tale about him getting it during the war in Germany for a packet of Woodbines.’

‘Is there a problem about that?’ asked Angela.

Trevor emptied his cup and Sian poured him another.

‘I called in at a jeweller’s when I was in Gloucester this morning. I showed him a photo of the watch that was taken for the coroner’s inquest. The jeweller said that model wasn’t made until 1950, so the story about getting it in the war was phoney. It’s worth a fair bit of money, too, though I don’t think Mrs B realizes that. Albert was only a railway worker, so where did he get a valuable Omega?’

‘It’s suspicious, but doesn’t sink her story,’ said Richard. ‘The ring could have been second-hand – and he may have got the watch by some underhand means and not wanted to tell her. Perhaps he stole it or won it in a poker game?’

The former police officer nodded reluctantly. ‘I suppose so. But why didn’t she tell me that he had been to hospital, when I asked her about his health? I spoke to his mates in the pub and they recalled that he had been hit by something at work and had concussion and a leg injury.’

‘Edward Lethbridge wants me to have a look at his hospital notes,’ said Pryor. ‘I’m not sure that they can help, but you never know.’

‘Lethbridge is going to have a word with Brian Meredith, but I can’t see him doing anything about an exhumation unless we come up with something a good bit stronger.’

‘Do you know where the remains are buried?’ asked Pryor.

‘In the council cemetery at Ledbury. They’ve only been down a few weeks.’

Sian listened with fascination. This was better than a hospital lab, with its endless routine blood sugars, ureas and fractional test meals. She never thought she’d hear someone ask ‘Do you know where the remains are buried?’

As Mitchell was leaving, Richard speculated on what Agnes Oldfield would make of the developments.

‘She’ll be proclaiming to the world that it was her nephew, jumping the gun before we’ve got any further,’ replied Trevor. ‘I hope Lethbridge will keep it to himself for now, but I suppose he’ll have to prove to her that he’s earning the fee she’s paying him.’

He drove off in the direction of St Brievals and left Pryor wondering what the next day might bring – hopefully, a decent meal prepared by their new employee. Then the memory of the trim and elegant Moira with her big blue eyes and black fringe momentarily overshadowed his obsession with his stomach.

As Richard Pryor drove along the A48 towards Swansea the next afternoon, he decided that lunch had definitely been a success. Moira Davison had explained apologetically that she had had little time to be adventurous with the menu, as she had needed to get supplies in from the limited range in the village shop and to get organized in the kitchen, finding out where things were kept. However, gammon, chips and peas had gone down very well, with a milky rice pudding to follow. He also decided that Moira was as efficient as she was attractive and hoped that her typing and office skills were going to be as good as her cooking.

Now he was on his way to meet the London lawyer, Leonard Massey, in the chambers of the coroner’s brother. As he passed through Pyle and reached Margam, he came within sight of the great new steel works at Port Talbot and he began remembering the route quite clearly. In his student days before the war, he used to go down to the Gower Coast on his motorcycle, a modest Excelsior two-stroke, which was a pig to start, but good once it got going. ‘The Gower’, as it was universally known, was a twenty-mile peninsula jutting westwards from Swansea, with one of the most beautiful coastlines in Wales. High cliffs, long beaches of golden sand, and a spine of unspoiled green hills made it one of the most popular targets for trippers and holidaymakers. Yet by the sound of it, that very attraction had caused the death of Massey’s daughter, if she had drowned along what could be a dangerous coast.

The Humber purred along through the heavily built-up industrial areas of Briton Ferry, Neath, Skewen and Morriston. He passed an oil refinery, tinplate and spelter works, forges and foundries until the last few dismal miles of old ribbon settlement took him into the town centre, virtually destroyed during the blitzes and rebuilt in the cheapest style of tasteless architecture of the austere post-war years.

The address he had been given was in Walter Road, which rose from the town centre along the flank of the hills that backed Swansea Bay, likened by some poet to the Bay of Naples, its five-mile curve of sand stretching round to Mumbles Head with its prominent lighthouse.